A lockout of tugboat crews is threatening major disruptions at ports across the country, potentially causing supply chain chaos in the lead-up to Christmas.
Tugboat operator Svitzer said it would lock out more than 580 workers indefinitely on Friday, from 17 ports in NSW, Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia.
Svitzer has been working to finalise an enterprise agreement for workers for the past three years. It has moved to the lockout after almost 2000 hours of industrial action by unions in the past month.
Maritime Union of Australia national secretary Paddy Crumlin said the action would throw Australia’s supply chain into chaos and have an “extraordinary” effect on businesses and consumers.
Workplace Relations Minister Tony Burke said the government’s industrial relations reform would help end such drawn-out fights.
“I’m devastated by the way the whole dispute has unfolded,” he told 2GB on Tuesday.
“I want a situation where the industrial umpire can come in and sort it out, and the laws to be able to do that are in front of the parliament now.”
NSW Transport Minister David Elliott described Labor’s claims its bill would help resolve disputes as “bollocks”.
“In the past 24 hours we have seen industrial harmony go back 25 years and we can’t live in a society where our entire nation’s trade is paused,” he told Seven’s Sunrise.
Mr Elliott accused unions of treating the Australian economy as a “plaything” as it was recovering from the COVID pandemic.
“It is not the time for unions to put a stranglehold on trade because we will find ourselves very lonely this Christmas with the difficulty of getting ships to and from our ports,” he said.
“This will be a difficult time and the unions are not playing fair.”
– AAP
